• Last night, I personally gave away 3 guns, and had an assist on 4 more.  I’d say that was a good night.
• I’d like to personally thank everyone who either attended the LouisvilleFNRA banquet or supported it via donations or buying a raffle ticket.  We had a great turnout and a wonderful time.
  • If you want to support your local committee by going to a banquet or getting involved, look them up.  It’s a great cause.
• Irish Woman made friends over dinner with the couple that not only won the key gun in the auction, but also won the DoubleStar Midnight Dragon.  I forgot to ask if they were adopting.
• It’s amazing how easy it was to sell tickets for a drawing that would fetch the winner a complete 3-Gun package.
• Of course, when we finished with that and I started selling chances for the Wall of Guns, they were lined up like I was giving away beer.
• The Glock 42 is itty bitty.
• I like the way the Sig Sauer P238 feels in my hand, even if it isitty bitty, but when I indexed along the slide, I muzzled the tip of my finger.
  • By the way, that was our “Ladies Gun” on the Plinko game, and it wasn’t even pink.
• I didn’t drink anything but water last night, but I still felt hung over until lunchtime today.  It’s just not fair.
• The cure for the hyperactive six-year-old seems to be about 4 hours in the sunshine at the water playground at the YMCA.
• Note to self – Do not let the grass in the dogs’ yard grow to four feet high again.

• Two turkey roasters, filled to the brim with ingredients, then set to 200 degrees for 24 hours, will produce 21 quarts of whatever sauce you were trying to create.
  • I made marinara and chili base.  21 quarts of each.  That should hold us through the winter.
  • 3/4 of a bushel of roma tomatoes, three onions, and my own special blend of flavorings in each roaster full.
• I may have complained yesterday about the injection in my finger, but I do feel a bit better.
• Sometimes a screw-up makes things look a lot better.
  • What I thought was cream colored card stock turned out to be metallic finished card stock.  But when I printed out the table placards on them, it looked pretty spiffy.
• By the time I got caught up enough to go on vacation, I really needed a vacation.
• There will be a few tickets to the Louisville Friends of the NRA Banquet sold at the door tomorrow night.  If you want to go, but haven’t gotten your ticket, the doors open at 5:30.  Hope to see you there.

Being stabbed in the middle joint of one of my index fingers and having steroids injected was the high point of my day.  I’m going to go drink a beer now.  See you all tomorrow.

• Probate court is not a happy place.
• Tonight I go to bed with the name I was born with for the first time in 30 years.  It feels good.
  • I was impressed that the judge could pronounce my name on the first try.
• For the first time in years, I went to a courthouse and wasn’t asked if I was a lawyer.
  • I was, however, asked if I worked there.
  • I was wearing a pair of black cotton slacks and a long sleeve, white, button-down shirt.  I guess that screams “I’m not a criminal”.
• It takes the shine off the day a tad when you have to interact with both of your ex-wives.
• Boo spent the evening drawing hieroglyphs on the driveway in chalk.  I’m not sure if he was summoning or putting up protections, but I’m keeping the shotgun handy.
  • Something about chaos, sight, and water.

• Southern Logic – When you order an unsweetened iced tea, the waitress assumes you’re diabetic.  Since this is the South, she will stay with you to chat about her daughter, who is diabetic, and how she always tries to make sure people don’t get sweet tea if they can’t have it.
  • She was confused when I politely refused the packets of artificial sweeteners she brought with my tea.
• Compartmentalization – The act of segmenting things so that shitstorms within any given compartment don’t leak into the others.
• I’m listening to an audiobook of lectures on 19th century European politics and diplomacy.  The professor sounds remarkably like one of my senior managers.  It’s a bit disconcerting.
• Happiness is taking your youngest son out for pizza and ice cream after a bad day.

• I am no longer allowed to use the phrase “bone breaker” when referring to the hand specialist myrheumatologist wants to send me to.
  • Neither will I be allowed to request “Terminator hands”.
• I am no longer allowed to use the phrase “Computer fall down, go boom” in a status message.
  • “Storage go bye-bye” probably ought to be on the list of things to not say in official communications, too.
• I am no longer allowed to compliment a customer for being a good canary in the coal mine.
• I am no longer allowed to suggest “jacking the old one up and shoving a new one underneath it” as a solution.
• I’m a baking fool.  Had to use up some bananas that were growing freckles and a batch of homemade butter that wouldn’t firm up.  So I made shortbread cookies and banana bread.
• We got over three inches of rain in the past 24 hours, and it’s still coming down.  If we can get a good, hot, sunny day, the tomatoes should all ripen quite nicely.
• Pork chops and hamburger were above $3 a pound today.  Guess we’re going to be having meatless Fridays for a while.
• Saw a woman at the grocery store today.  Her 10-ish year old son was being a little turd, but I’m proud to say that her turning around and saying “Do you want me to embarrass you in front of all these people?” seemed toright his little wagon.
  • And yes, her Kentucky accent was quite syrupy when she said it.
• One stage at the shooting match yesterday had us simulating walking the dog and being attacked.  We took a penalty if we stopped moving or let go of the leash while shooting.
  • I don’t know about you, but if I’m walking Moonshine and five guys jump out of the bushes, he’s on his own for getting home.
  • You could do a variant of this where you have to pick up a sandbag “child” and walk to an “exit” with a lot of no-shoots and valid targets that pop up.

• It says a lot about our society when we confused the clerk at the courthouse by showing up with our paperwork in order, our checkbook ready to pay the fees, and our identification out.
• Dear Valhalla Golf Course – I hope your fairways get a case of the creeping turf plague.  Putting all of your entrances on the busiest highway in my area, not telling your vendors that semi-trailers will not fit through the main gate, and not having adequate traffic control is making me a little testy.  You can’t tell me that you spent millions to create a huge lawn for people to chase little white balls and didn’t think to have a back entrance for freight.
• Dear country music station – you are not playing classic country tunes.  Willie is classic, Wynonna is not.  Loretta is classic, LeAnne is not.  Patsi is classic, some pop tart who is wearing cowboy boots and a straw hat with her mini-skirt and crop top is not.  Also, I really like Toby Keith, but bless his heart, he isn’t classic.  Get thee to the record vault and get some Williams, Williams Junior, Paycheck, and Cash.
• No, I wasn’t staring at you while you poured Mountain Dew into your daughter’s sippy cup.  I was memorizing her face so that if she ever tries to date my son, I can forbid it to keep your genes out of my pool.
• We made a breakthrough with Boo tonight.  When I bought a watermelon, he protested that he didn’t like watermelon because of the seeds.  Discovering it was a seedless watermelon, he decided to try it.  He ended up eating three big slices.

• I came to a decision this morning.  You see, we have been having fresh milk and cream delivered to the house.  It’s part of Irish Woman’s “eat local, eat organic, eat healthier” effort, and since I like the convenience, it’s been worth the extra expense.  Plus, how many kids nowadays can say they have a milkman?  Anyway, this morning, not for the first time, Boo turned his nose up at a glass of milk because it’s not fresh from the cow, still smelling of clover.  Mind you, it wasn’t sour or chunky or anything, it was just coming to the end of its lifespan.  Irish Woman tasted it, got an Oscar for her performance in “Oh my god, you fed the baby sour milk!”, and opened a new half-gallon of milk.
  • Now, I know sour milk.  I have the child protective services file in Minot, North Dakota to prove that I know what spoiled food looks, smells, and tastes like.  This milk was not sour.
  • That is when I decided that I am going to invest in a yak, and make milking her one of the children’s daily chores.
  • Soon, you will hear me yelling “Get out there and pull on that yak!”.
• In related news, a trip up to the local nursery to buy farm-fresh eggs yesterday resulted in the discovery that Crash will follow his humans up the street if given the opportunity.  This was discovered as Girlie Bear and Boo were about to go into what counts as a business area in our little neighborhood.  This prompted a trip back home with the feline cuddled in Girlie Bear’s arms like the little foundling that he is.
  • Crash was not available for comment, as he had again escaped outside and was probably plotting mischief of some sort.
• Irish Woman and I went out on a date last night.  For once, we spent an evening having dinner and talking, and conversation did not revolve around guns, the children, or work.  I know, the world must be coming to an end.
• That moment after you move your car at the gas station, but before your lovely wife comes out of the stop-n-rob with the sodas, is delicious.
• Note to self – shut off the HVAC fan before replacing the filter next to it.
• Note to self – a HVAC filter, wrapped around the axle of the HVAC fan, makes one hell of a racket.
• That moment after you have removed the HVAC filter from the HVAC fan, then have your wife turn the HVAC fan back on, but the HVAC fan does not restart, is less than delicious.
  • Luckily, it was just the breaker.
• Look, lumber yard, I just want to build a 6 foot by 4 foot by 6 foot tree house for my son, not build a luxury wilderness condo out of rare Brazilian black cherry.
  • Ye gods and little fishes, have you all see the cost of pressure treated wood lately?

• If you’re trying to sell me something, and claim that you don’t have do things the way your competitors do, that doesn’t mean you’ve just changed the name of things.
• Irish Woman refuses to accept my assertion that I do not need people skills, for I do not need people.
• Is it bad that I feel uncomfortable around nice, happy people, but feel right at home in a room full of sarcastic, cynical people?

• One bushel of pie apples makes a lot of stuff.
  • So far, I’ve gotten one load into our food dehydrator, and Irish Woman has made two double batches of apple-cinnamon-bourbon preserves.
  • For those of you counting at home, it takes 21 average-sized apples to fill our food dryer.
  • We still have a lot left.  Probably dry a lot of them, and possibly can some pie filling.
  • We have had our semi-yearly discussion about why we are not able to distill the fruit into liquor.
• 4 hours of sleep in 48 hours is not as easy when you’re 43 as it was when you’re 23.
• I think that if I had consumed just a little more coffee this morning, I would have started hallucinating.
• Dropping an aluminum canning kettle onto a box full of new jam, making a heck of a noise and breaking the seal on a couple of jars, will cause you to swear quite artistically.
• It’s kind of nice to not have to run the air conditioner and sleep with the windows open in July.
  • On the other hand, my tomatoes need hot, humid weather, so I’m hoping this is a short cold spell.